"The Greatest Show on Earth" - Discussion 3 (Chapter 3) - Think Atheist2017-08-18T03:21:57Zhttp://www.thinkatheist.com/forum/topics/the-greatest-show-on-earth-4?groupUrl=readatheist&groupId=1982180%3AGroup%3A53975&id=1982180%3ATopic%3A674532&feed=yes&xn_auth=nomaybe we should just post wha…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6871252011-06-02T02:34:44.425Zoneinfinityhttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/JamesWParsons
<p>maybe we should just post whatever further comments we want to make in the original thread <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.thinkatheist.com/group/readatheist/forum/topics/the-greatest-show-on-earth-1" target="_blank">"The Greatest Show on Earth" - Read Along!</a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>I'm still reading the book and would like to post comments, it helps to retain the information.</p>
<p>maybe we should just post whatever further comments we want to make in the original thread <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.thinkatheist.com/group/readatheist/forum/topics/the-greatest-show-on-earth-1" target="_blank">"The Greatest Show on Earth" - Read Along!</a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>I'm still reading the book and would like to post comments, it helps to retain the information.</p> Okay. Great. I am part of a A…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6870762011-06-02T02:00:23.907ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
<p>Okay. Great. I am part of a Atheist Dog Lovers group on TA. I'll ask them over and then ask this group who is interested.</p>
<p>Sorry to go off subject.</p>
<p>Okay. Great. I am part of a Atheist Dog Lovers group on TA. I'll ask them over and then ask this group who is interested.</p>
<p>Sorry to go off subject.</p> that's how I assume it works.…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6870372011-06-02T01:32:33.689ZJason Lamar Sorensenhttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/JasonLamarSorensen
that's how I assume it works. I talked about starting this one because I wanted to read the book we are reading and I got a good amount if responses for it. Then I started! The following fell off a bit but there are still a few that follow it.
that's how I assume it works. I talked about starting this one because I wanted to read the book we are reading and I got a good amount if responses for it. Then I started! The following fell off a bit but there are still a few that follow it. I think I did go ahead after…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6870172011-06-02T01:22:25.995ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
I think I did go ahead after the dog part. Now I HEAR Dawkins when he said, "Chapter X" - LOL.
I think I did go ahead after the dog part. Now I HEAR Dawkins when he said, "Chapter X" - LOL. PS - You can click on that li…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6870152011-06-02T01:20:42.426ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
PS - You can click on that link to hear a sample. It is totally about evolution of the dog and humans and suggests evidence of co-evolution.
PS - You can click on that link to hear a sample. It is totally about evolution of the dog and humans and suggests evidence of co-evolution. Maybe this could be the next…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-02:1982180:Comment:6870132011-06-02T01:17:44.406ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
<p>Maybe this could be the next book: "Dog Who Couldn't Stop Loving: How Dogs Have Captured Our Hearts for Thousands of Years" by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson</p>
<p><a href="http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B0045ZW9QO">http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B0045ZW9QO</a></p>
<p>How do you start? First get a bunch of folks to agree to get the book?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Maybe this could be the next book: "Dog Who Couldn't Stop Loving: How Dogs Have Captured Our Hearts for Thousands of Years" by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson</p>
<p><a href="http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B0045ZW9QO">http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B0045ZW9QO</a></p>
<p>How do you start? First get a bunch of folks to agree to get the book?</p>
<p> </p> I thought that whole section…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-06-01:1982180:Comment:6866452011-06-01T20:58:43.043Zoneinfinityhttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/JamesWParsons
<p>I thought that whole section was very fascinating, well really everything in this book is, but anyway. A very interesting point about how when domesticated animals go feral that they very quickly sort of revert to something close to their pre-domesticated state. Yet, though we know that dogs are descendants of wolves, the state they revert to in the wild is more like "village dogs" than wolves; which implies that the wolf went through an intermediary stage where it was "self-domesticating"…</p>
<p>I thought that whole section was very fascinating, well really everything in this book is, but anyway. A very interesting point about how when domesticated animals go feral that they very quickly sort of revert to something close to their pre-domesticated state. Yet, though we know that dogs are descendants of wolves, the state they revert to in the wild is more like "village dogs" than wolves; which implies that the wolf went through an intermediary stage where it was "self-domesticating" by becoming adapted to live closer to humans and feed off their refuse piles. Absolutely fascinating!</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And also, though I don't think Dawkins said this, and it might be wrong, but it makes some sense to me [ah well, i guess it's all implied in the whole "village dog" thing]: tied in with what you mention next, Pleiotropy (hah, i'd never have remembered that term if you hadn't brought it up!) that in this long process of the wolves becoming adapted to this environment, selecting for that perfect zone of "flight distance," were selecting the trait that would lead to them being able to be domesticated; as well as indirectly (pleiotropically) selecting the genes that would change their appearance from wolfiness to dogness!</p> Oh, and I learned a new word.…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-05-31:1982180:Comment:6848182011-05-31T14:15:22.168ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
<p>Oh, and I learned a new word. Pleiotropy (mutations that effect more than one trait). He mentions it when he talks about the silver fox experiment.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Oh, and I learned a new word. Pleiotropy (mutations that effect more than one trait). He mentions it when he talks about the silver fox experiment.</p>
<p> </p> First, it's really hard for m…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-05-31:1982180:Comment:6848052011-05-31T13:51:44.937ZGloria Stevenshttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/GloriaStevens
<p>First, it's really hard for me to know what a chapter is, since this is a talking book. So if I get ahead, sorry.</p>
<p>As you can tell from my avatar, I'm a dog lover. Dawkins goes into the idea that we probably (actually, he sounds pretty sure) didn't domesticate the dog. The dog is a result of natural selection. The artifical selection (fine tuning of different breeds) came later after we learned the concept of artificial selection.</p>
<p>I'm wild about this idea and had studied it in…</p>
<p>First, it's really hard for me to know what a chapter is, since this is a talking book. So if I get ahead, sorry.</p>
<p>As you can tell from my avatar, I'm a dog lover. Dawkins goes into the idea that we probably (actually, he sounds pretty sure) didn't domesticate the dog. The dog is a result of natural selection. The artifical selection (fine tuning of different breeds) came later after we learned the concept of artificial selection.</p>
<p>I'm wild about this idea and had studied it in detail before Dawkin's brief description. But since we are reviewing this book I will stop here.</p>
<p>Dawkins does a wonderful job explaining how science measures time and age. It was a nice review for me. Since this book has creationists in mind, he built this all up to explain how the flood theory could never be. I'm guessing his younger self never thought he would have to explain how "Head for the Hills" couldn't have happened.</p>
<p>PS - his build up of artificial and natural selection and dating is to understand a concept in chapter 4.</p> Finally had time to finish th…tag:www.thinkatheist.com,2011-05-28:1982180:Comment:6805682011-05-28T00:48:09.258Zoneinfinityhttp://www.thinkatheist.com/profile/JamesWParsons
<p>Finally had time to finish the chapter and I guess I really don't have a lot to add to what you guys have said. Most of the chapter seemed pretty straightforward, not really much that seemed difficult to understand. Like Heather said, Dawkins sets the stage for getting down to business about natural selection by "softening us up" (lol) with his discussions of artificial selection and sexual selection. And I thought it was a nice transition when we moved from humans being the artificial…</p>
<p>Finally had time to finish the chapter and I guess I really don't have a lot to add to what you guys have said. Most of the chapter seemed pretty straightforward, not really much that seemed difficult to understand. Like Heather said, Dawkins sets the stage for getting down to business about natural selection by "softening us up" (lol) with his discussions of artificial selection and sexual selection. And I thought it was a nice transition when we moved from humans being the artificial selectors to birds and bees and insects (totally agree that it's truly amazing the way all these co-evolve.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I guess there's 2 main points that really jumped out at me. The 1st is the discussion about the process of natural selection, while being similar in many points to these other processes, is unlike them in one very important way: there is no "choosing" agent in natural selection at all. I thought it was interesting that it was Darwin himself who, innocently, basically caused the problem by talking about evolution in a manner that seemed to attribute some kind of guiding design behind it. Like saying that "natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing..." obviously gives the wrong impression. I felt this was important because it still seems to be one of the big problems that people have when trying to really understand evolution. I watch a lot of programs that deal in one way or another with evolution and they are always saying things in such a way that it sounds like evolution is some force that is proactively acting on a species with end-result adaptations in mind. That is exactly not true.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The other point i was struck by is when Dawkins points out that "Artificial selection is not just an <em>analogy</em> for natural selection. Artificial selection constitutes a true <em>experimental</em> - as opposed to observational - test of the hypothesis that selection causes evolution." That was one of those "ah-ha!" moments for me :)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>One example of the adaptations that plants have made that i thought was pretty incredible was the "bucket orchids", the ones where the bee falls down in the pot and the has to crawl out through a little side hole, where it's trapped while "pollinia" are glued to it's back, held in place till the glue dries and then is released to hopefully carry the pollinia to another orchid. Wow! that is quite a series of steps. Very cool.</p>